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CHAPTER 11. FLOOD <br />11-19 <br />$106 million in coverage, as of September 29, 2018. According to FEMA statistics, 197 flood insurance <br />claims were paid between 1978 and 2018, for a total of $2.3 million, an average of $11,531 per claim. <br />Properties constructed after a FIRM has been adopted are eligible for reduced flood insurance rates. Such <br />structures are less vulnerable to flooding since they were constructed after regulations and codes were <br />adopted to decrease vulnerability. Properties built before a FIRM is adopted are more vulnerable to flooding <br />because they do not meet code or are located in hazardous areas. The first FIRMs in Kittitas County were <br />available in 1981. <br />Table 11-12. Flood Insurance Statistics for Kittitas County <br />Jurisdiction <br />Date of Entry <br />Initial FIRM <br />Effective Date <br /># of Flood <br />Insurance <br />Policies in Force <br />as of Sept 29, <br />2018 <br />Total Coverage <br />(Building and <br />Contents) <br />Number of <br />Claims, <br />1978 to <br />2018 <br />Value of <br />Claims paid, <br />1978 to 2018 <br />Cle Elum 05/05/1981 12 $2,968,900 16 $147,440 <br />Ellensburg 05/05/1981 61 $14,203,700 14 $114,545 <br />Kittitas 04/15/1982 2 $556,000 5 $10,509 <br />Roslyn 06/05/1985 1 $291,000 0 $0 <br />South Cle Elum 05/05/1981 2 $500,000 0 $0 <br />Unincorporated <br />Kittitas County 05/05/1981 355 $87,827,500 162 $1,999,192 <br />Total - 433 $106,347,100 197 $2,271,687 <br /> <br />The following information from flood insurance statistics is relevant to reducing flood risk: <br />• There are a total of 433 Active Insurance Policies in Kittitas County. 59 percent of the Active <br />Policies are in a floodplain, and of those, 93 percent are in the 100-year floodplain. <br />• There are 1,790 residential structures in the floodplain, 75 percent of which are single family <br />structures. 45 percent of all single family structure in the floodplain are in the 100-year <br />floodplain. Only 9.6 percent of the total residential structures in the county are single family <br />structures in a floodplain. <br />• The average claim paid in the planning area represents about 5 percent of the 2018 average <br />assessed value of structures in the floodplain. <br />The percentage of policies and claims outside a mapped floodplain suggests that not all of the flood <br />risk in the planning area is reflected in current mapping. One way to understand flood risk outside the <br />mapped floodplains is to consider where active policies and historical claims are located. Based on <br />information from the NFIP, 41 percent of active policies and 36 percent of historic claims are for <br />structures outside an identified special flood hazard area. Of the total value of claims paid, 24 percent <br />were for properties outside an identified 100- or 500-year floodplain. Figure 11-5 shows the location <br />of historical flood insurance claims since 1978, aggregated by census block.